John L. Swigert, Jr., in full John Leonard Swigert, Jr., byname Jack Swigert (born Aug. 30, 1931, Denver, Colo., U.S.—died Dec. 27, 1982, Washington, D.C.) U.S.astronaut, participant in the Apollo 13 mission (April 11–17, 1970), in which an intended Moon landing was canceled because of a ruptured fuel-cell oxygen tank in the service module. The crew, consisting of Swigert, Fred W. Haise, Jr., and Comdr. James A. Lovell, Jr., returned safely to Earth, making use of the life-support system in the lunar module. Swigert was a last-minute substitute for Thomas K. Mattingly, who had been exposed to measles (though he never became ill).

John Swigert, Jr., 1966.

NASA

Swigert graduated from the University of Colorado, Boulder, in 1953 and was awarded a master’s degree by the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, N.Y., in 1965. Before becoming an astronaut in 1966, he was a U.S. Air Force pilot in Japan and Korea and a commercial test pilot.

Swigert took a leave of absence from the space program in 1973 to become executive director of the Committee on Science and Technology of the U.S. House of Representatives. He resigned from the committee and from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in 1977 and entered private business in Virginia. He ran unsuccessfully for a seat in the U.S. Senate in 1978 but was elected from Colorado to the House of Representatives in 1982, shortly before his death.

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November 14, 1933 Biloxi, Mississippi, U.S. American astronaut, participant in the Apollo 13 mission (April 11–17, 1970), in which an intended Moon landing was canceled because of a rupture in a fuel-cell oxygen tank in the service module. The crew, consisting of Haise, John L. Swigert, Jr.,...

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(1931-82). Originally on the backup crew for the Apollo 13 lunar mission, U.S. astronaut John L. Swigert, Jr., took over as command module pilot just days before the mission’s launch, to replace an astronaut who had been exposed to the German measles. The flight took off on April 11, 1970, but ran into problems after about 55 hours, when an oxygen tank in the service module exploded. All of the command module’s fuel cells and oxygen tanks were damaged. Swigert and his crewmates-spacecraft commander James A. Lovell, Jr., and lunar module pilot Fred W. Haise, Jr.-used the life-support system in the lunar module and returned safely to Earth on April 17.